Blind switch (jack doyle mysteries)

by John McEvoy

  Mortvedt gave Repke an icy stare. “None of our fuckin’ business,” he said. “Remember that.”

  On their way toward the door, Mortvedt stopped at the lunch counter and addressed a stocky Navajo man, a backstretch worker who had been quietly monitoring their negotiations with Connaughton.

  “Chief, let me ask you something,” Mortvedt said. “How bad off is Mr. Connaughton’s sick grandchild?”

  The man snorted, then turned back to his beer. “That old tight pockets never been married in his long and sorry life.”

  When they pulled away from Santa Fe the following morning, Repke looked back. He could see through the window into Lancaster Lad’s trailer stall. “Horse’s doing fine back there,” he said.

  Mortvedt drove slowly away from Barn 14. Repke watched as Connaughton’s barn receded in the right-side mirror of the pickup.

  Repke said, “Twenty-eight grand for this little horse? Man oh man….”

  “Didn’t want to bargain with the bastard any longer than we did,” Mortvedt said, turning the wheel of the truck out of the stable area and onto the service roadway. “What do I give a shit whether we paid too much? What we paid wasn’t our money.”

  “Shake hands with that man, better ask for a receipt for your fingers,” Repke said, as W. R. Connaughton continued to enthusiastically wave goodbye. “He thinks he’s pulled off the biggest score in these parts since the Spaniards rode in.

  “That old son of a bitch,” Repke concluded admiringly, “would sell the grazing rights on his grandmother’s grave.”

  Chapter 22

  When Ronald Mortvedt had begun killing horses for a living, back in Louisiana a few years earlier-piece work that he picked up from an old friend of his who was training on the show horse circuit-his methods were crude.

  Early results were mixed and rough, involving horses driven into fences, others inoculated with toxins that would develop into fatal diseases, some urged onto well-traveled highways through holes created in farm fences.

  Some of these results passed the post-mortem scrutiny of the insurance companies. Others did not. After collecting his up-front money, Mortvedt would only receive the remainder of the agreed-upon payment if the policy was paid off in full. It bothered Mortvedt, and his friend and business scout, Chuckie Lanier, to be what they considered short-changed if the insurer did not come through.

  So, Mortvedt worked to improve his murderous technique. A dead horse wasn’t worth much to him or its owner if it appeared to have been clumsily slaughtered. These horse deaths, Mortvedt realized, had to be as natural or accidental appearing as he could make them. Calculating and thorough, Mortvedt spent months devising ways to meet the standard of efficiency required.

  Not long after he first came to Kentucky to do his killing work for Harvey Rexroth, Mortvedt fastened upon a neater, cleaner method than before. He began suffocating his equine victims.

  At first, Mortvedt used a practice he’d heard about from Chuckie Lanier, his Louisiana cohort. This involved stuffing ping-pong balls up the nostrils of the horse so that air-flow was halted and suffocation followed. The problem here was the time involved: too many minutes-between ten and fifteen minutes, usually, during which discovery was always a possibility-spent with the terrified, struggling horse, trying to hold its head in place and keep it from crashing around the stall in its frantic attempt to breathe. The horses made too much noise as they thrashed about, terror-driven, their hooves resounding off the flooring. There was no way to keep that from happening. Mortvedt came to believe the risk of this technique, no matter how effective it was as a means of so-called natural death, was too great.

  Mortvedt switched to plastic garbage bags. This was another tremendously effective method, leading to suffocation and the resultant “death from natural causes” perceived by those who did not have a clue as to what was going on, but it, too, had its drawbacks. It was difficult and dangerous work to keep the garbage bag tight enough over the head of the panic-stricken horse who would fight so desperately for life.

  Both of these methods required the enlisting of a muscular assistant, for as strong as he was for his size, Mortvedt could not manage this alone. Thus it was that Jud Repke had been sought out and signed up. “You got the strength, Jud,” Mortvedt rather grudgingly admitted.

  After their joint venture had been in full swing for many months, Jud Repke found himself becoming increasingly reluctant to go on these jobs, despite what he regarded as the amazing amount of money he made working with Mortvedt. Jud would get a summoning call from Mortvedt, agree to a meeting, then try to figure out a way to get out of it.

  Jud was never much good at that kind of figuring. But Ronald Mortvedt was awfully good at reading the thoughts and intentions of Jud Repke.

  One night, as they sat drinking beer in the parking lot of Repke’s apartment building, Mortvedt said, “Goddam it, Jud, what’s wrong with you? Every time I tell we got us another one to do, you give me that hangdog, hound dog look of yours. I don’t fucking get it. Your daddy had to work half a year up in those coal mines where you’re from to make what I get you in a couple of hours. Hours!

  “Now, you never did come straight with me about how much money you made stealing those fancy cars. But I sure as hell doubt it was any more than I’m putting into your pocket. And the risk factor…shit! You see any risk factor in this?

  “That’s why I don’t get what your problem is,” Mortvedt said, angrily crumpling his empty beer can.

  Repke realized, somewhat uneasily, that this was probably the longest statement he had ever heard from the close-mouthed Cajun. He was further unnerved when he heard Mortvedt say next, “And I don’t like it a goddam bit, man,” giving Jud that slit-eyed sideways look that never signaled anything good as far as Repke had observed.

  Jud looked out the window of the car. He said, “It’s not that I mind what we’re doing. It ain’t that. And the money is goddam golden, man, I know that. I appreciate that.” He turned to face Mortvedt and said, “I just don’t like the way we’re doing it. I hate to see those horses suffering like that, it just bothers the shit out of me. I see their eyes rolling around in their heads, their chests bulging out….I don’t like it. It stays with me.”

  The memory of Mortvedt patting, and chirping to, and otherwise distracting the horse named Wilton Lad so Jud could suddenly slip the deadly garbage bag over its head came back to Repke with a horrifying flash. He couldn’t help but shudder. He hoped Mortvedt hadn’t noticed.

  Jud nervously took a short pull on his quart of beer. He didn’t like to complain to his benefactoring buddy, that was for sure, but he didn’t like the dreams he was having, either. However, weighing Mortvedt’s menacing expression against his need to express himself, Jud figured he’d gone far enough on this subject. And he sure as hell didn’t want to admit to Mortvedt that he was dreaming about dying horses.

  That was why he was relieved to hear from Mortvedt, who had stopped silently gazing at him, “Shit, man. You ain’t got to worry no more about that stuff. I got a new way of doin’ them, won’t bother you at all.”

  “What is it? How does it work?” Repke asked.

  “You’ll see,” replied Mortvedt. “It’s fuckin’ foolproof, man. Don’t leave a mark on ’em, and it makes it look like they colicked.”

  “Colicked? What’s that mean?”

  “Horses die of it all time. They get sick and their intestines get twisted up, it’s called getting the colic,” Mortvedt said. “But the way I kill ’em now, they don’t hardly feel nothin’ and, bang, it’s over.”

  Repke nodded his head slowly, looking at Mortvedt with renewed respect. He thought to himself again how lucky he was to have met old Ronnie down there in Oakdale.

  Aldous Bolger, never a heavy sleeper, was awakened by the sound of a rain-bearing wind coming in from the west. The wind ebbed and flowed, then was followed by the sound of the raindrops arriving in a steady tip-tap against his bedroom window. When Bolger cocked an eye at the elec
tric clock, it read 1:47 a.m.

  Bolger lay there for some three minutes, unsuccessfully trying to burrow his way back into sleep. Then he got up, dressed quietly so as not to awaken Caroline and the children where they slept in the two other bedrooms, and sat briefly on the screened porch of the house, enjoying the sweet smell and discreet sound of the soft night rain. Finally, growing restless, he donned his green windbreaker with the Willowdale logo above the left breast pocket. After he’d put on a cap and stepped off the porch, he decided to inspect the barn area. There was nothing to arouse his suspicions, nothing he was consciously aware of; rather, his decision to patrol the grounds and visit the stud barn was prompted purely by restlessness.

  At first Bolger lowered his head as he walked down the gravel drive toward the stallion barn. But the smell and feel of the warm rain on his face was pleasant, spurring memory. For a few moments, he raised his face to the night sky, eyes closed, relishing the sensation of the drops falling, remembering how he’d done this so many times as a boy back in the hills of New Zealand.

  The first thing Bolger noticed as he neared the stallion barn was a briefly flashed beam of light that raked across the window near the broad doorway. He wiped the rain off his forehead. He wondered if he might have imagined seeing the light.

  Then he heard one of the horses whinny loudly, and the sound of a human voice responding in a harsh, low tone, saying something he could not discern.

  Bolger felt his heart rate accelerate. There was a surge of adrenaline, a welcome feeling that coursed its way through his body and into his big hands. He wondered briefly where Alan Henry, the night watchman, was; probably on patrol near the broodmare paddocks. That must be it, because the Ford pickup normally parked near the stallion barn entrance was absent.

  Bolger ran silently forward. After flattening himself against the wall of the barn, he moved carefully toward the open doorway.

  There was another small sound, followed by other movements by several of the obviously disturbed horses. An odor of fear emanated from them. They were shuffling their feet, their big bodies banging against the sides of their stalls.

  Bolger felt a surge of anger: that these harmless creatures should be frightened and trembling at the obviously unwanted presence of strangers infuriated him. Before slipping through the doorway, he took off his boots. Although the floor of the barn was covered with expensive rubber bricks, he didn’t want to risk making any sound. He crouched down and moved inside, knowing someone was in there with his horses.

  The bastards are here and I’ve found them, finally, Aldous thought. Don’t go wobbly now, man, he said to himself, stay cool, stay cool. He slipped into an empty stall across the broad aisle from where he’d heard the noises, then dropped to his knees and peered out carefully past the wooden partition. What he saw then both astonished and enraged him further.

  Unaware of Bolger’s hidden presence only yards away, Ronald Mortvedt was preparing to employ his new, improved method of horse murder: death by electrocution. He had run an extension cord from the outlet near the far doorway to the stall in which lived an aged, no longer very productive stallion named Burlington Boy. With his back to Bolger, Mortvedt was whispering to the horse as he approached him, electrical cord in hand.

  From where he crouched across the way, all Bolger could see was a small man, dressed all in black and wearing a black mask. He couldn’t see that the extension cord Mortvedt carried had been sliced down the middle, or that Mortvedt had fastened alligator clips to the ends of the exposed wire strands that were now ready to deliver a jolt of electricity, one that would surge from the horse’s nose to tail. All Aldous could discern was that the little man was talking softly to Burlington Boy, who was shifting restlessly about even though Mortvedt had a good grip on his halter. Mortvedt then reached up and clamped one of the alligator clips to the horse’s left ear. He then began to move to the rear of the stall. There, he placed the other clip in the horse’s rectum.

  Horrified, Bolger realized what he was witnessing; realized that, once the two clips were in place, what was coming next was for the extension cord to be plugged into the wall socket. Burlington Boy would be instantly electrocuted.

  Bolger had but an instant to regret that there was no weapon at hand for him to use, that he had left his house without picking up his otherwise ever-present cell phone that Rexroth demanded that he carry during work hours.

  Briefly Bolger debated whether to slip back out of the barn and get help. He could summon the absent Alan Henry by phone. He could even call the big house, ask for the bodyguard, Kauffman, to come down.

  But if he did that, Bolger knew, the gallant old horse Burlington Bob would surely be dead before he could return. Aldous Bolger, horseman through and through from the days of his New Zealand youth, made his decision. He moved quickly from his hiding place and across the barn’s broad aisle.

  As Bolger hollered toward the little man, “You bastard, drop that cord,” he thought he heard a sound behind him. He couldn’t be sure, for his concentration was on Burlington Boy and the little man dressed in black. The little man dropped the cord. Bending down, he yanked a knife from inside his right boot. He turned quickly, glaring at Bolger from behind his mask.

  Bolger saw the knife but moved forward anyway. There was another sound behind him. He had just begun to turn to look over his shoulder when Jud Repke struck. The last thing Bolger heard was the whistling sound of a heavy pitchfork handle cutting through the air, its handle leveled at him in a high, flat swing.

  That thwacking blow rendered Bolger instantly unconscious. Blood began trickling from his right ear, which was now flattened against his skull.

  “Bastard’s breathing,” Repke said. He looked wildly around the barn. His chest was heaving and his hands were awash with sweat. It was easy for Mortvedt to take the pitchfork from him.

  “Can’t do this horse now,” Mortvedt said, his mouth twisted with anger. “Who the fuck is this motherfucker coming in here on us? Goddam, the old man won’t pay us for this fuck-up.

  “We got to get out of here,” he added.

  “What about this fella?” Repke asked. He didn’t want to look down at the man he’d just attacked so violently. He wanted to get away from this place as quickly as he could. But Jud found he couldn’t move his feet; it was as if they were locked in quicksand. Part of it was Mortvedt, standing there coiled up with fury at what had developed, this blown job, the first they’d ever had.

  Mortvedt’s grip tightened on the handle of the pitchfork. He looked across Bolger’s prostrate form at the shaken Repke. “Don’t turn pussy on me now, Jud. Not now. I’ll teach this old boy not to mess us up,” Mortvedt said, his chest heaving.

  Repke paled as he saw Mortvedt raise the pitchfork. “Ronnie, wait, don’t kill him,” Repke pleaded. “I’m not in this with you for no murder charge.”

  Mortvedt paused, the fork at shoulder level. “All’s I said was teach him a lesson. And I will.” He looked across Bolger into Repke’s face, grinning that terrible little icy grin of his, the meanness of him thick and tangible in the darkened barn.

  He brought the pitchfork handle down with a sickening thud on Bolger’s left knee. The sound was like a muffled gunshot. Mortvedt raised the fork again, this time slamming it down on Bolger’s right knee. Bolger cried out from the depths of his unconsciousness. Mortvedt hooted with satisfaction. Repke, stunned by the terrible damage he’d just seen done, was barely aware of Mortvedt shoving him toward the barn entrance.

  “Let’s get the fuck out of here,” Mortvedt said. He motioned to Repke to pick up the electrical cord and clips. He handled the pitchfork himself. The only sound as the two men exited the barn was that of the unsettled horses, moving about in their stalls.

  Chapter 23

  Just after 2:30 that rainy morning, Doyle was awakened from one of his rare dreamless sleeps by the sound of the phone near his bed. As he reached for the receiver in the dark, the thought flashed to mind that never in his life ha
d he ever answered a phone call in this section of the night that signaled good news.

  “Jack,” he heard Caroline’s voice saying, speaking low so as not to awaken her children, “Jack, I’m terribly sorry to call you at his hour. But,” Doyle heard her whisper urgently, “Aldous has gone out, and not come back, Jack. I think he went on one of his late-night inspection tours. I was reading in bed, and I barely heard the front door open and close. He said nothing before he left.”

  “How long ago?”

  “More than a half-hour. He never takes that long usually. And I just rang his cell phone but there’s no answer. Jack, could I ask you to go and take a look for him?”

  “No problem,” said Doyle. “I’m sure nothing’s wrong,” he added, wishing that he felt a bit more confident of what he’d told her, “but I’ll go right out. We’ll be back soon,” he assured Caroline before hanging up. He slipped on his jeans and boots, reached for yesterday’s T-shirt, and was out the door in his poncho a minute later. Before he started down the cottage steps, however, he turned back, went inside and grabbed the heavy flashlight he kept in a pantry cupboard. It was the only weapon-like object he owned. He hoped he’d need it only for its illuminating powers.

  Doyle trotted through the rain to the stallion barn and entered through its open door. The horses stirred and shifted noisily in the darkness. Doyle felt for a light switch to the right of the door. Unable to locate it, he switched on the flashlight, then the lights. Moving forward slowly he approached the body centered on the barn floor with horrified disbelief.

  The right side of Bolger’s head was so swollen and disfigured Jack briefly thought it was another man, one he did not know. But then he recognized the New Zealander’s blood-spattered windbreaker, the one with the Willowdale Farm logo, and his eyes fastened on the distinctive white-blond hair turned dark by the pool of cranial blood in which it lay.